la-li-loong

Chinese Pidgin English

FWOTD – 27 August 2020

Alternative forms

• la-li-lung, lally loong, lally-lung, laliloon

Etymology

From Macau Pidgin Portuguese, from Portuguese ladrão, from Latin latrō.

Noun

la-li-loong

1. thief
   • 1889 November, Thomas W. Knox, “The Talking Handkerchief”, in Harper’s New Monthly Magazine, volume LXXIX, number CCCCLXXIV (in English), New York: Harper & Brothers, publishers, page 941:

     “La-li-loong muchee talkee one piecee man dielo savvey no can,” he remarked, which is equivalent to “The thieves are saying that a dead man doesn’t know anything.”

2. a contemptible person
   • [1876, Celestial Empire (in English), 1875, quoted in Pidgin-English Sing-Song, or Songs and Stories in the China-English Dialect, London: Trübner & Co., page 127:

     The barber complained he had been called a la-li-loong, the Pidgin-English for thief.]

   • [1911, Jay Denby, Letters From China, and Some Eastern Sketches (in English), London: Murray & Evenden, Ltd., page 189:

     The natives are also more hostile to the sport as practiced by foreigners than heretofore, and trouble is becoming more and more common. The cry “Lally loong” (thief) follows the sportsman everywhere.]